f a n f i c t i o n - r o m a n c e
"When you're consumed by death it's hard not to want to die yourself."
Freyja Wendall could've spent her entire life denying what she was. She would've gladly stayed with her drunk of a father pretending th...
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"A WENDALL'S SECRET"
PETER RUMANCEK STOOD IN front of his mother with an amused face as he told her the events of the day prior. He didn't realize how he was meeting so many different creatures that had no idea what they were, had no idea how to control their gifts. "She was gorgeous," Peter told his mother. "Completely. I know she was one, mother. I know that she had to be one. I could sense it. She avoided touching anyone. It only makes sense." His mother nodded as she thought about the Wendall's. She'd known that they were relatives to the species, she'd known that the girl's grandfather had been one himself, but she had never been able to do as much research to figure out how the curse worked.
"It's the Wendall's biggest secret," She told her son.
✡
Freyja ran into her grandparents house. She decided not to go to school, she didn't feel strong enough to avoid human touch- to avoid anything of that matter. She felt her body shivering. She knew it was the side effect of passing through dimensions, but she didn't understand why the moment she left the other dimension the cold seized her. She rushed toward her bedroom before ducking under the covers. She raised them above her body attempting to get the shivers to end. "What are you doing home?" Her grandfather's voice drew her from feverish state.
"I don't feel good," She told him. It wasn't a lie. He watched her squirm under the blankets before nodding. She knew he knew there was more to the story, but he turned and left without another word. She thought he'd left for good, but he returned to check her tempature. She was scared. She avoided checking her tempature since a little after her mother's death. She'd broken it with how cold her body was. "You can't." His eyes seemed to critisize her, but he didn't make a move to take hers. Instead he put the thermometer under his own tongue. She watched confused as the tempature went to an ungodly low before shaking and cracking at the cold. She gulped as she looked up at him.
"What are we?" She asked. "What is happening to me?"
"The same thing that happened to your mother," He said. "The reason she took her life. You must understand, Freyja. This curse, we have it isn't unliveable. We Wendall's from my bloodline, we have it-all of us. It's not just you."
"Does Christina-"
"She's Eleanor's biological granddaughter, not mine," He told her.
"How do you touch Eleanor," She asked. "Without-"
"There is a way to control it," He said. "When you build a real connection with another person. It isn't as bad. It's a minor chill or sometimes if it a really strong connection-like a father to his daughter or a soulmate you can feel warmth, but once that connection is made you won't see the deaths that they have." That was why she could touch her father. She loved him, and he loved her, a connection. He raised his hand over his face.
"When you touched me the other day, I saw Dabria," He told her. "She was screaming. It was the worst connection that I've felt in years, Freyja. I just I don't understand what she was screaming."
"I can't," Freyja remembered the words clearly. They never left. They stayed vibrating against her mind, pounding on her skull as hard as possible. "Not anymore. I'm sorry. I can't." She looked up from her bed meeting her grandfather's eyes. "You can't escape it, my child. I tried, but it will always be there. It will be the end of you, just as it was for me." She watched as horror erupted in his eyes. "It will catch up to you." He nodded. That was what he'd heard, but could barely make out.
"She's angry," He said. "She's not at peace." Freyja shook her head. She'd known that much. "Listen, when we see spirits we see the ones that haven't moved on. The ones that are angry, or the ones that have someone they feel the need to look after. Your mother she isn't looking after you, right now. She's angry at her genes, my genes. Don't ever listen to her, you understand?" Freyja nodded.
"I just don't understand," Freyja said. "It didn't start until my mother died." He nodded, knowing that himself.
"Sometimes the curse doesn't act until someone you love is about to die," Bill explained.
"So," She said. "If my mother hadn't of killed herself, I might not have ever gotten the curse? How was yours activated, my mother's?"
"My parents were in a car accident when I was younger," He told her. "My father died on sight, but my mother made it to the hospital-made it to me before she passed. As for your mother, Hemlock Grove is filled with mysteries, Frey. One being the creatures that reside here, and your mother's best friend was taken by one right in front of her eyes." Freyja nodded taking in the information that he was spilling out to her. She had someone who knew, who understood the pain...the cold, and she wanted to be as educated on her abilities as she possibly could. Yet, still she didn't even know what she was.
"What am I?" She asked again. "I still don't understand."
✡
Peter looked at his mother as he considered her statement. "I never got that aura around Christina," He told her. His mother nodded as if that much was obvious.
"Christina's mother was adopted by Bill Wendall," She said. "After her mother's biological father abandoned both her and Eleanor. The curse doesn't run in Christina's veins, but it runs in Freyja's. It runs in her mother's."
"So," Peter said. "She really is one?"
"Yes," His mother smiled. "She is a-"
✡
"I don't feel the name does us much justice," Bill told his granddaughter. "In fact, humans have us all wrong in explanation. Besides the screaming, of course, but they call us Banshee's."
